Secondary Q's -- With Pictures

[specialized]

Last weekend I moved my beer to secondary. Was planning on leaving in primary for three weeks but decided to start another batch. Now my question is, would it be okay to bottle after only one week in secondary and two in primary? Or should I wait the two weeks as per the 1-2-3 rule?

Another thing, judging by the yeast cake at the bottom of my secondary does it appear that I did a poor job siphoning? Any tips for not stirring up too much junk when transferring?

 

[Six_O_Turbo]

If you have the means, it would be best if you could crash cool it for a couple days before you bottle. It will help compact the yeast and clarify your beer so it is easier to siphon without pulling trub.

Otherwise, you'll be fine bottling as long as fermentation is complete.

 

[mojotele]

You're probably fine to bottle.

The yeast cake at the bottom is pretty small and most if not all of that yeast was probably in suspension when you racked from primary. The darker portion looks like yeast clinging to the sides, not part of an actual cake. The more solid looking light portion is your actual yeast cake.

The 1-2-3 thing is just an average. Some beers need more time in primary and absolutely no secondary. Some beers need months in the bottle.

 

[JJL]

You're fine. The yeast cake looks completely normal. As long as this is a normal gravity ale, you should be fine to bottle. If you are still concerned, take a hydro reading today, and then again a couple of days from now. If they are the same, then bottle.

 

[specialized]

before moving to secondary the hydro readings stalled out. So i'm not too worried about fermenting continuing. However, i was suprised at how much yeast fell out of suspension even after leaving the yeast cake in the primary.

But thanks for letting me know all is good. Now it's time to find a good priming sugar calculator. As you can tell from those pictures I didn't exactly top off to 5 gallons, and don't want to overcarbonate.

 

[JJL]

before moving to secondary the hydro readings stalled out. So i'm not too worried about fermenting continuing. However, i was suprised at how much yeast fell out of suspension even after leaving the yeast cake in the primary.

But thanks for letting me know all is good. Now it's time to find a good priming sugar calculator. As you can tell from those pictures I didn't exactly top off to 5 gallons, and don't want to overcarbonate.

You'll always have yeast in the bottom of the secondary. It's like mojotele was saying, you pull suspended yeast over from the primary to the secondary. Not all yeast falls out of suspension in the primary. If it did, there wouldn't be any left to carb when you went to bottle.